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Friday, January 15, 2016

Chevron chain is a surprisingly versatile stitch, considering how simple and delicate that it can be. The unique way that the beads link up allow for lots of variation, including adding two-hole beads, or creating a floral pattern. One of my favorite ways to enhance a simple chevron chain is to incorporate daisy chain stitches. It’s also a reader favorite, and a tutorial for this technique has been requested many times. To get ahead of springtime inspirations, here at last is the method for adding daisies to a chevron collar.

You don't need to be familiar with chevron chain to try this technique, but some practice with classic daisy chain might be helpful. It's important to make sure that the daisy stitches are as snug as possible to get a smooth, cohesive look in the beadwork.

For this tutorial, we’re using 11/o seed beads in classic white and yellow for the daisies, and turquoise blue for the chain. Once you’ve mastered the basics of the stitch, you can add additional patterns to the chevron chain for a variety of looks. Don’t be afraid to mix up your floral colors, too!

1. Attach a stop bead to a comfortable length of beading thread, leaving about an 8 inch tail. Pick up 19 blue seed beads. Slide them down to the stop bead, and stitch down through the first 3 beads again. Pull snug to form a teardrop shape.

2. Pick up 11 blue seed beads. Skipping the 3 beads that you just stitched through, and the previous 3 beads in the teardrop, stitch up through the next set of 3 beads and pull snug. (These are beads 16-14 from the first step).

3. Pick up 10 blue seed beads. Stitch down through beads 6-8 from the previous step and pull snug.
With any variation of chevron chain, it helps to think of the pattern as having 6 segments. In the first stitch we set up these 6 segments, then add 3 more with each additional stitch. Every segment in this project contains 3 beads, except for the top and bottom edge, which contain 4 and 5 beads, respectively.

4. Pick up 1 blue and 6 white seed beads. Slide them down to the beadwork, then carefully stitch back up through the 1st white bead added. Pull as snug as you can to form a small loop of white seed beads.

5. Pick up 1 yellow seed bead. Carefully stitch up through the 4th white seed bead picked up in the previous step. As you pull the thread snug, let the yellow bead click into place in the center of the white ring.

6. Pick up 7 blue seed beads, and stitch up through the center 3 beads of the last downward stitch in the chain.

7. Repeat step 3 to add 10 beads in a downward stitch. Add 11 blue beads in an upward stitch, followed by another 10-bead stitch. Repeat steps 4 and 5 to add a new daisy.

8. Continue the pattern, adding a daisy on every second upward stitch, until your chain reaches the desired length.

The daisy chain segments roughly match the length of the plain 5-bead segments on the bottom row, because the center of each daisy contains 3 beads, and we're adding a blue on each side. With only 4 beads in each of the segments of the top row, this will create a gentle curve that is perfect for collars. To eliminate the curve, use 11 beads in every plain stitch – you could also alternate daisies on both sides of the chain for a pretty bracelet.

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